Two for court over Collins murder

Two men are due to appear before the Special Criminal Court in Dublin on Friday charged with the murder of Limerick business man Roy Collins.

The 34-year-old was shot dead in April 2009 outside his family’s arcade business at the Roxboro Shopping Centre in Limerick.

His murder was described by government ministers as a “direct attack” on the criminal justice system, as Mr Collins was targeted because a member of his family had testified against a senior figure in the McCarthy-Dundon criminal gang in Limerick.

The murder of Roy Collins led to new anti-gangland legislation which gave further powers to gardaí and also paved the way for the introduction of new criminal offences surrounding membership of criminal gangs.

In May 2010 James Dillon (26) originally from the southside of Limerick was jailed for life for the murder of Roy Collins.

However, gardaí remained steadfast in their pursuit of those who ordered the hit and the man who was seen in the getaway car with Mr Dillon after the shooting.

In July 2012, a loaded semi-automatic Glock pistol believed to be the weapon used in the murder was found city near the railway tracks in Rosbrien in Limerick, close to where the Mercedes car used by Mr Collins’s killers was found abandoned and on fire on April 9th, 2009.

A man cutting grass on behalf of a local rugby club discovered the badly rusted Glock pistol.

Today at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin, gardai made an application that two inmates currently serving prison sentences for other matters, be produced before the same court on Friday when they will be charged with the murder of Roy Collins.

One of the men aged in his 30's is suspected of ordering Mr Collins's murder while the second man who is in his 20's is believed to have travelled in the with the gunman James Dillon.